A 28-year-old El Salvadorian woman has been sentenced to 30 years in prison after she was accused of having an abortion following a medical emergency.
The Associated Press reports that the woman, only identified as “Esme,” was found guilty of aggravated homicide.
“The judge acted with partiality, giving greater weight to the version offered by the Attorney General’s Office, which was loaded with stigmas and gender stereotypes,” the Citizen Group for the Decriminalization of Abortion said in a statement. The organization also helped Esme with her defense.
She had been in pre-trial detention for two years before she was released in October 2021. In October 2019, she had gone to a public hospital while pregnant, and hospital employees reported her to the police after she miscarried, perVice.
“This sentence is a blow to our efforts to release women unjustly incarcerated and a violation of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, which has said obstetric emergencies must be treated as a health problem,” Morena Herrera, president of the Citizen Group, told the outlet.
El Salvador is among five Latin American countries that have completely prohibited abortions. Women who are convicted of abortion face prison sentences after suffering through miscarriages, and have been charged with homicide before. The same rules apply even when the women are raped or their lives are at risk.
Esme is the first woman in seven years to face a prison sentence for abortion. During the last 20 years, around 180 women in the country have been prosecuted following obstetric emergencies that caused them to lose their babies. According to AP, since 2009, 64 women have been released in El Salvador, and since December, eight women’s prison sentences have been reduced.
